


Right in Front of Me

by CinnamonLily



Category: Teen Wolf (TV)
Genre: Alive Hale Family, Alternate Universe - Human, Alternate Universe - No Hale Fire (Teen Wolf), Fashion Designer Peter Hale, Hale Fashion Empire, Injury Recovery, Inspired by Music, M/M, POV Multiple, Scarred Derek, Scars, Soldier Derek Hale, Uncle/Nephew Incest, bad mother Talia
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-03-01
Updated: 2019-03-01
Packaged: 2019-11-07 12:48:54
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,091
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/17960846
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/CinnamonLily/pseuds/CinnamonLily
Summary: Derek pulled Peter off the couch and into his arms. “There’s a song I want you to hear,” he said quietly, and leaned to push the remote control of Peter’s fancy entertainment system.ORHow Derek and Peter got together, told through multiple POVs in weird snippets, because... my brain?





	Right in Front of Me

 

 

 _I'll use you as a warning sign_   
_That if you talk enough sense then you'll lose your mind_   
_And I'll use you as a focal point_   
_So I don't lose sight of what I want_   
_And I've moved further than I thought I could_   
_But I missed you more than I thought I would_   
_And I'll use you as a warning sign_   
_That if you talk enough sense then you'll lose your mind_

_And I found love where it wasn't supposed to be_   
_Right in front of me_ _  
Talk some sense to me_

 _And I found love where it wasn't supposed to be_   
_Right in front of me_ _  
Talk some sense to me_

Amber Run - I Found

 

*

 

Talia loved her son. Her beautiful, perfect baby boy that grew into a gangly awkward teenager and then a handsome young man. All her children had good genes, and it was a relief to her, because when you came from a long line of people in the fashion industry, there were certain expectations. She would’ve liked to say she’d loved an ugly child as much as she did her beautiful ones, but she wasn’t sure.

So when she got the call that he’d been injured in a landmine-related incident somewhere in a desert on the other side of the world, her first thought was “oh God, not his face!”

 

*

 

Peter hated his sister. He loved his nieces and nephew, and he even had fond feelings toward Joe, Talia’s husband, but he hated his sister with a passion that scared him sometimes.

When he heard the unspoken words in her tone when she called him to let him know Derek had been injured in duty, he saw red. He told her he was taking a sabbatical from his job as a designer for their family business, and to her sputtering he informed her that she was not to go near her son and that Peter would take care of Derek.

 

*

 

Derek woke up every now and then. First in the field hospital, then in Germany a few times. On the plane Stateside. He wasn’t sure how many times he’d woken up when he opened his eyes and saw his uncle asleep in a chair next to his hospital bed. Smiling hurt, and he remembered they’d told him he’d need plastic surgery. Something about burns on his face. God, his mother would love that.

He looked around as much as he could without moving his head and saw nobody else there. There was a card on the table next to the head of his bed that had his sisters’ signatures inside, that much he could tell. Derek narrowed his eyes and saw a smaller signature that just said “Dad” in the bottom corner.

He must’ve hissed when his smile pulled the skin on his cheek, because Peter woke up with a start. The look he gave Derek was filled with so much affection and relief and—and that one thing they’d never really spoken about.

 

*

 

Cora sat in Laura’s living room and felt like a cartoon character with steam coming out of her ears.

“I’m done,” she hissed, got to her feet, and began to pace the length of the floor to ceiling windows showing Central Park at dusk. “I will never fucking walk for her. On any catwalk. I’d rather break my own legs, Laura.”

Her sister, slightly less temperamental but no less pissed off nodded vigorously. “Do you think Uncle Peter would still leave with us if we asked?”

Cora stopped and looked at Laura. “Gender neutral clothing? Colors in menswear? Slutty yet chic?” Those had been the definitions they’d thrown out into the world, or at least in the space between the three of them last year when they’d all been pissed off at Talia for yet another reason.

“Uh-huh,” Laura hummed, then grinned. “Once Der is better, Peter won’t want anything to do with Mom ever again.”

Cora nodded. “I think he’s taking Derek to Beacon Hills.”

“Of course he is. As far away from Mom was possible. I think that’s a solid idea.”

“I’ll miss Dad,” Cora said in a small voice, which prompted Laura to get up and come to hug her.

“I know, Coco, I know. He’ll come visit if we ask, and there’s Facetime,” she comforted her, using a childhood nickname that was just between them, Derek, and Peter.

“What about Peter and Derek?” Cora whispered against Laura’s hair.

It was something they hadn’t talked about in words before, but they both knew it was there.

“They’re adults. Who are we to comment on that anyway?” Laura said in an equally hushed voice.

Cora nodded. “As long as they’re happy.”

“They will be.”

 

*

 

Peter was pretty sure Derek wasn’t in a condition to travel to Beacon Hills, but he signed himself out of the hospital anyway. The next few days were long and tiring and, in Derek’s case, painful and filled with a haze of painkillers.

There’s a calm to him, though. A calm that was never there before he went to do this last tour. A calm that hasn’t been there since Kate waltzed into their lives. In some ways, Peter blamed himself for Kate. If Peter hadn’t had a relationship with Christopher, Derek had never met his sister, right? Maybe so.

“What are you thinking so hard?” Derek croaked from the passenger’s seat.

“That we’re about nine miles from home,” Peter lied, happy that Derek can’t hear his heart skip a beat.

“Oh,” Derek grunted and straightened in his seat.

“Yeah, the cabin should be ready, the man who maintains it has stocked it for us, too.” He’d told that to Derek before, in the hospital when Derek had panicked about going to his mother.

“Right, you said.” Derek smiled at him slowly, wincing a little less now. The bandage on his cheek was one of those breathing, see through things that some people used to cover fresh tattoos.

Peter nodded and continued to drive, placing his hand on the seat next to Derek’s thigh, palm up. Without hesitation, Derek took it and pulled it to his lap, tangling their fingers together.

 

*

 

It took Derek about a week to look at himself in the mirror for the first time. He quickly averted his gaze and went back into the master bedroom where he climbed under the covers to hide from the world like he had as a little boy when something went wrong.

Peter’s “cabin” was more like a medium sized house in the preserve that Hales had founded hundreds of years ago. The land the cabin stood on had always been given to the oldest son, which was why Peter had it, and why, if he died before Derek, it would be Derek’s after.

Derek didn’t want to think on those lines though. It was unbearable to even consider a world without Peter in it.

“Hey,” Peter said from the doorway. He slid under the covers and smoothly became the big spoon, holding Derek as if it was the easiest thing in the world to do when Derek couldn’t even look at himself. “I have dinner ready soon. Do you think you want to get out of bed?”

Derek managed a shrug, but that was about it. At least he had Peter’s warmth against his perpetually chilled skin.

 

*

 

Laura called Peter every couple of days, but there was rarely any news. Derek was depressed, barely went outside even though the preserve was dressing itself in the autumn colors Derek loved the most.

“Should Cora and I come to visit?” she asked one evening.

Peter sighed at the other end of the call and seemed to give the question genuine thought. “No. Not yet. I… I need to figure out how to shake him out of his funk first. He’d just feel guilty.”

“Okay.” She stayed quiet for a while, thinking about whether she should say what she wanted to.

“What is it, Laur?” Peter sounded fond, and Laura felt a surge of love toward her uncle.

“Do what you do best.”

“And what is that?”

“Love him.”

 

*

 

Derek felt the bed dip next to him. He didn’t have the strength to do or say anything. It turns out he didn’t need to. Peter was there to do the talking.

“I realized I’d fallen in love with you when you were sixteen and I was twenty-seven,” Peter said quietly into the… it was probably night time.

Derek’s brain caught up with the timeline, and he peeked out of the bedding, looking at Peter who sat with his back against the headboard.

“Yes, the year before I met Chris,” Peter confirmed his thought. “I made us move away from the family and I tried to forget you. Then Paige happened, and….”

Derek’s first girlfriend Paige died in a car accident when Derek was nineteen. He was so distraught Peter and Chris moved back to New York. It had helped, but it had also make Derek realize he was in love with his uncle. He had to get away, so this time it was he who ran. He just took it to another extreme and enlisted.

He was on leave after his first completed tour when Kate came to visit Chris and….

“When Kate… I blamed myself, I blamed Chris, but I never blamed you,” Peter whispered just loud enough for him to hear.

Kate had somehow figured out how to get her hooks into Derek and that Derek had a secret. She’d extorted him, he’d lost half of his trust fund by the time Peter caught it, and then… well, she ambushed Peter and stabbed him when he was coming home from work one night.

Derek would never forgive himself for it.

“It wasn’t your fault,” Peter said as if hearing his thoughts.

“Yeah,” Derek snorted with self-disgust. “Well now we match.”

Except the scarring Derek would have covered half his face, and the one long scar that split Peter’s right eyebrow and ran down his cheek to his jaw—he’d been so close to losing his sight—was more of a silvery thing now. Derek would have puckered skin forever, because he didn’t even want plastic surgery.

 

*

 

“I suppose so,” Peter mused. “I guess I’ll start sleeping in the guestroom then.”

That gave Derek pause. “W-what?”

“If we match, if you think we’re ugly, then you don’t want me here anymore. Not… not in the way I want to be here, right?” And while Peter knew what he’d just said was a lie, that he was just using basic psychology to get to Derek, part of him still quivered with fear that Derek would just give in and tell him to go.

“What? No! You’re not—I mean I’m—”

“You’re beautiful. Some scar tissue isn’t going to change that, Derek.”

Derek went still and silent then.

After a long while of just breathing, Peter asked, “Did you know Chris asked me to marry him, twice?”

Derek shook his head.

“Well he did. First about a year of us being together, and that was too soon. I wasn’t over you yet,” Peter explained.

Derek turned his face so that Peter couldn’t see the obvious hurt there. When had he gotten such a low self-esteem? How hadn’t Peter noticed? It couldn’t just be the scarring.

“The second time was two weeks before Kate attacked me. It was his last resort to try and save our relationship, I guess. But then he looked at me when I stayed quiet, and he said ‘you’re in love with someone else’ and I couldn’t lie to him.”

This time, Derek turned back to him and moved closer, looking up at him from the pillow next to Peter’s side. For a while he was quiet, but then eventually he seemed to come to a decision and said “Twelve.”

It took Peter a while to understand what he was saying, and when he did…. “Oh, pup.”

Derek launched himself at Peter then, burying himself into Peter’s arms as he shook apart. Peter stroked his greasy hair through it all, until he was wiped out from crying and Peter’s shirt was a snotty, teary mess.

Peter liked that Derek didn’t apologize. That he knew it was okay. That Peter would take care of him when he needed to.

“Let’s go shower?” Derek asked eventually.

Peter didn’t ask if he meant together. He knew that was exactly what Derek meant.

 

*

 

Joe put down his book and watched as Talia finally made her way from the master bathroom into the bedroom. She looked tired, but there was a tinge of something he’d rarely seen in her—sadness.

“What’s wrong?” He pulled back the covers for her to slide in and waited for her to come rest her head on his chest like she always would.

“They’re leaving me,” she said quietly. “The girls, and Peter. And… and Derek.”

Joe wasn’t sure what to comment to that. It was something they both knew would happen eventually. Talia was a hard woman, a horrible person to work with, and even more difficult as a mother and a sister. The rest of the Hales weren’t any less headstrong, and this wasn’t the first time someone, or multiple someones, had left New York to get away.

“I think they—I mean Peter and Derek, they have….” She didn’t want to say it out loud.

“I know.”

She turned her head so she could see his face. “For how long?”

“Since Derek figured it out for himself when he was… twelve, I think. He came to me to ask if he could marry Uncle Peter when he was older.”

She didn’t ask why he hadn’t told her before. She didn’t need to. She knew the answers, all possible ones, already.

“What did you answer him?” she looked curious in a gentler way, as if the memory of their middle child at that age was precious to her.

“I told him that people couldn’t marry family members, and that a lot of people would think it was weird and wrong if something was to happen between them when Derek was older. But I also told him that when he got to be an adult, he was free to make his own decisions about life and who he loved.”

She lowered her head on his chest again and nodded. Soon after, he felt her tears roll down his skin, and held her as she wept for the losses she’d brought onto herself.

 

*

 

Their relationship didn’t turn sexual for a long time, at least past rubbing against each other in the shower or hand jobs under the covers. Derek didn’t feel ready, and Peter read him like an open book. It felt like a blessing and a curse, really.

Derek had had some encounters with men in the army, which had just made him more certain about being bisexual. That wasn’t the issue he had with sex. He still thought he wasn’t good enough. That he was damaged good with his face being ruined and his psyche being so fucked up.

It took Cora and Laura appearing one day to make him see he might’ve been worthy after all.

Neither of them batted an eye at his face that was now rapidly healing. It was Thanksgiving, and it was the first year any of them didn’t go to their parents’ place if they were in the country.

His sisters were overjoyed to get to spend it with him and Peter, and they collectively decided not to talk about Talia, even though they all spent a few moments on the phone with Joe.

It was a good evening, and when the girls left to go to stay at the Holiday Inn—they had an excuse ready, which Derek appreciated, not that he’d minded if they’d stayed at the house with them—Derek pulled Peter off the couch and into his arms.

“There’s a song I want you to hear,” he said quietly, and leaned to push the remote control of Peter’s fancy entertainment system.

 

*

 

Peter swayed in Derek’s arms and listened to the song. He couldn’t help the tears welling up when Derek leaned in to kiss him, with purpose this time.

Peter didn’t care about the logistics, he just wanted to make love to the love of his life.

They weren’t wearing much clothing, just sweats and T-shirts as the cabin was warm, and they were naked, still slow-dancing, in no time.

Peter took the lead and danced them toward the bedroom, while Derek went with him and smiled radiantly. Peter could tell he wasn’t at all conscious of his cheek, just happy to be there in the moment with Peter.

They fell into bed with and “oof” and a laugh, just as the song changed in the living room. It was another slow song, and it made for the perfect background noise for Peter to take Derek apart with his hands and mouth.

“What do you want?” Peter asked after what felt like an hour of exploring his nephew’s body.

“I don’t care, I just want you,” Derek whispered, looking vulnerable again.

“This is your decision,” Peter told him firmly but gently, knowing that Derek probably didn’t have much experience with men—not that he wanted to think about that at all.

Without saying anything, Derek spread his legs to slot Peter between them. Peter leaned in to kiss him as he reached for the lube.

He opened Derek up carefully, making him whine and eventually thrash on the bed with frustration.

“Come on, Uncle Peter,” Derek snapped finally, and hell if that didn’t make Peter’s cock jerk.

The song from before, the first one, was playing again in the living room when Peter finally pushed into Derek and let him adjust for a while.

They locked gazes as Peter began to move ever so slowly. Peter knew this would forever be “their song” and would find himself humming it under his breath every now and then in the future.

“I love you,” Derek whispered when they were completely wrapped around each other and Peter was getting close to coming.

“I love you too.” Peter covered Derek’s mouth with his own and swallowed his moans as they came almost at the same time.

 

*

 

Derek woke up feeling sore in a way he’d never felt before and smiled. The fact that the skin on his cheek pulled a little barely registered.

He rolled over and cuddled against Peter’s side. He’d never felt so happy before.

  
  
  
  
  


**Author's Note:**

> This is what happens when you have the same earworm for a week. And because the people at Steter Network's Discord (I'm looking at you, Folgers!) are dirty enablers.


End file.
